Illustration:
Ben Tupas

Ways to teach new tricks

At a recent video workshop for “My Crazy Passion” a participant reminded me of that old saying “Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for day; teach a man to fish and he’ll eat forever.”

I considered again how it sits with the whole idea of teaching and learning.

And while it might be quicker and easier to follow the “I know, I know but can you just do it for me…” request, taking the time to pass on your knowledge reaps far greater rewards.

The much bandied about fishing analogy stills rings true: learning a new skill can lead to bigger payoffs.

How about cutting out the middleman, empowering the learner, building independence, moving towards a more sustainable future and feeling more satisfied with your personal achievement? The list goes on.

But how should one teach?

Here’s a collection of approaches that I’ve gathered in my past life as a school teacher and in my current role as an Open producer.

Prior knowledge

Before teaching begins, find out if your learners have any prior knowledge of the topic you’re about to address.

If they know nothing, that’s fine - proceed full steam ahead. If they do know a little (or a lot), then tailor and truncate the learning to suit.

You may be able save time by condensing or even skipping the introductory parts of what you originally planned and head straight for the meatier bits.

In effect, you’re catering for the needs of the learner by meeting them at where they are at.

People learn in different ways

There is no “one size fits all” t-shirt for learning.

Some people prefer bright colours, others desire something baggier with the freedom to dance, while others will opt for the structure and coverage of the turtleneck.

Traditionally our earliest exposure to learning happened in a school setting and typically emphasised reading and listening.

However, if these methods didn’t suit, hopefully you can now pinpoint or gravitate towards the more ideal ways of absorbing knowledge.

Balance the teaching methods you employ. Consider learners that do best when they’re moving around and working with their hands, those that enjoy working in groups or in solitude, learners that enjoy details, specs and number combinations and those that prefer visuals.

A small side note: the ‘death-by-Powerpoint-slideshow’ phenomena is a either a result of over-catering for visual learners or the mistaken thinking that because we are bombarded by visuals everyday in the digital age that we will somehow automatically learn better that way.

Avoid jargon unless it serves a purpose

Jargon can be the trigger for people to switch off from the learning process. Don’t automatically assume people know what you are on about.

Signs of jargon fatigue: eyes will glaze over, faces do little to hide blank expressions and people start to daydream about being somewhere, maybe in a place with a foreign language (what jargon sounds like) but are enjoying it because they are in some exotic holiday destination (not here now) and more importantly, not listening to you.

But if there’s a strong reason for jargon teach it.

Teaching the language of film to a budding group of videographers makes sense, for example. Here jargon provides specific and speedy conversation. It’s easier to say ‘mid-shot’ rather than ‘frame the shot by cropping at the person’s waist’ again and again.

Keeping the end goal in mind

What’s your end goal? Identify the sequence of skills that need to be taught and learnt to reach this end goal.

Is it possible to digest everything in one sitting, or is better to serve it in bite-sized morsels with breaks between each course?

Again, the learner drives these decisions. If you’re teaching writing to beginners, you might start things flowing by brainstorming ideas. If you backtrack a little, you might in reality need to start by simply teaching the art of brainstorming.

Keep directing what may sometimes seem like disparate elements back to the whole, end product.